In the next 12 months, the democrats and the government will engage in a tug of war over the detailed arrangements for the election of the chief executive and legislators in 2012, and a possible road map towards the ultimate goal of universal suffrage. But, so far, neither side has raised another crucial issue: the need to pass a law that will govern the registration, conduct and finance of political parties.
The government has always been lukewarm towards a political party law. This is consistent with its general policy that political parties should be tolerated rather than promoted. Hence, while the Basic Law does not impose any restriction on the political party membership of the chief executive, the Chief Executive Election Ordinance contains a provision that disallows any candidate at a chief executive election, as well as the appointed chief executive, to be a member of any political party. When the bill passed through the legislature in July 2001, this particular provision was supported by the then Democratic Alliance for Betterment of Hong Kong (DAB), the largest political party in the city.
The absence of a specific law on political parties does not seem to worry the DAB. The fact that there is no statutory requirement governing the nature, limits and disclosure of party donations outside the election campaign period gives the DAB (and all other political parties) tremendous flexibility to solicit or receive donations that could become a source of corruption and abuse.
Like the DAB, the Democratic Party chose to register itself under the Companies Ordinance. In 2006, it applied for a judicial review against the application of the standard requirement imposed on registered companies to disclose the names of their members. It argued that this provision, if applied to political parties, would jeopardise freedom of association and privacy rights. In the end, the party not only lost the case but was also criticised by many outside for maintaining an opaque position.
Political parties can also be registered under the Societies Ordinance. But this ordinance does not encourage the registration of political parties because it empowers the government to prohibit the operation of a society in the interests of national security or public safety, or on the grounds that it is a political body with connections to a foreign or Taiwanese political organisation.
Whether a political party law should allow party members to remain anonymous is debatable, given Hong Kong's particular circumstances, when some democrats are denied entry to the mainland of their own country because of their political affiliations. It is also arguable whether the presence of a legal instrument would help the development of political parties, given the interplay of other factors. But there are two purposes for which a political party law is needed.